Australia has seen its fair share of superstars. They’ve had Rod Laver, arguably one of the best to ever play the sport, Lleyton Hewitt, Pat Rafter, and Nick Kyrgios.
However, a new name has arisen and he’s one of the youngest and brightest to play the game.
At nineteen years of age, Alex de Minaur is a tennis player that has shocked audiences everywhere with his huge results in 2018. With a playstyle almost completely different from the other high-caliber players, Alex is on track to be a top-tier player.
But, of course, there will be challenges that Minaur will have to face. He’s a young blood and doesn’t have the experience that most players possess.
Furthermore, with competition on the tour at its highest due to big names like Nadal, Federer, Zverev, and Djokovic, De Minaur isn’t going to have an easy season.
But right now, Aussies are putting their money on this player to be their next big thing. Can he prove them right? But most importantly, is he a viable betting option for you? With blistering speed and a motivation like no other, Alex de Minaur could become the next Australian superstar.
Alex de Minaur is a nineteen year old tennis player. Born in Sydney, Australia, Alex de Minaur started playing tennis at a young age. He exceled on the junior circuit, reaching a career-high ranking of two in the world and at the 2016 Australian Open, de Minaur managed to win a doubles title alongside partner, Blake Ellis.
He began his professional career in 2015 and soon found success. He reached the Quarterfinals of the Spain F22, his first tournament of his professional career. In 2016, he attended the Australian Open via a wild card and made two ITF finals.
However, it wasn’t till 2018 where he really caught the attention of fans all over the world. That year, he had his best run yet, reaching the semifinals of his first tournament, Brisbane. Afterwards, he would reach the finals of his hometown tournament, Sydney, an ATP 500 tournament that would skyrocket his ranking.
From then on, Alex de Minaur became a world-class player. It became more common for the then eighteen year old Aussie to take down top one hundred players and place deep into the bigger tournaments.
Now, he’s going into 2019 with the likes of Adolfo Gutierrez and Lleyton Hewitt backing him. With two legendary players to coach him and provide him with guidance for the future, it’s very possible that Alex de Minaur can break the top ten.
He’s only nineteen years old, meaning he has many years left to create his own legacy alongside the other Australian superstars. And with the talent he possesses, there’s a good chance he’ll be put alongside the best of the best.
Most tennis players at the age of nineteen are looking to win their first ATP point for their professional career. Alex de Minaur has already done more than that. Since 2018, Alex de Minaur has accumulated several notable achievements.
His first breakthrough was the Sydney final where he beat four top fifty players on his way to facing off against Medvedev in the final. These four were Fernando Verdasco, Damir Dzumhur, Feliciano Lopez, and Benoit Paire.
A few months later, De Minaur reached won the Nottingham Challenger, taking down several highly-ranked one hundred players. Then, at the Citi Open, Alex de Minaur one-upped his previous performance with an even stronger one, reaching the finals after taking down several notable names.
First, he took out Canadian superstar Vasek Pospisil. Then, he took down former USC powerhouse, Steve Johnson. Afterwards, he took down Hyeon Chung who was top thirty in the world at the time. His quarterfinal match looked like it was going to be the toughest one as he was going up against Andy Murray, a former world number one and big four player.
Luckily, with a withdrawal from the Brit, de Minaur propelled into the semifinals where he would face off against Andrey Rublev, a Russian prodigy who was slowly making his way up the rankings. Alex de Minaur took him down in three sets but fell in the final against Zverev.
At the Shenzhen Open, de Minaur reached the semifinals, taking down three top one hundred players—Yuichi Sugita, Mackenzie McDonald, and Damir Dzumhur. He would eventually fall to Pierre-Hugues Herbert but in three close sets in which De Minaur lost the final set 6-8 in the tiebreak.
Then, to close out the year, Alex de Minaur put up a dominating performance at the Next Gen ATP Finals. He dominated the Groups Stage and would reach the finals. However, he would fall to Stefanos Tsitsipas in five sets.
Despite this, De Minaur created an extremely strong precedent for the 2019 season. The question is, whether or not he can replicate his success.
Alex de Minaur has one of the more interesting playstyles out of the new generation coming up. Players like Borna Coric and Kyle Edmund are known for their huge strokes that can help dominate from the basleline.
Rather than holding to this type of game format—which is a format that most players like to run—Alex de Minaur thrives on defense. In fact, defense is the strongest part of his game. It’s what helps him play against the big names of the pro tour right now.
In order to better understand Alex de Minaur and his playstyle, you need to look at the pros and cons of the game he currently holds.
Pros
As I’ve said before, De Minaur is known for his defense. Right now, he is one of, if not the fastest player on the tour right now.
His court coverage is so high that most professional players will find it hard to truly take him down with two or three strokes.
At the Sydney Invitational, it was his speed that kept him in the game against Fernando Verdasco and it was what helped him secure major points in each round he played. But it doesn’t end there. He isn’t just fast enough to take down the big shots.
He also holds a very strong sense of where to direct the ball when on the run. Whenever a player is on defense, it’s hard to direct a ball as easily as it would be if someone was at a neutral stance or playing offense.
But for Alex de Minaur, this is different. It doesn’t matter if Alex de Minaur is on the run. He can still cover the ball extremely well and then move it wherever he needs to place it. This makes it extremely tough for serve-and-volleyers to take him down with a serve plus one strategy.
Furthermore, with the game of tennis becoming much more oriented around shorter points, Alex de Minaur is the wild card that no one really knows how to take down with an implemented strategy. You essentially have to play very scrappy to take down de Minaur.
In order to have the speed the Minaur possesses, you also need to have a strong mental game and Alex has just that. You rarely see Alex de Minaur get mad. Instead, he assesses most situations with a sense of long-term thinking.
And whenever he wins a big point, Minaur doesn’t hold back, showing his emotions with a fist pump or a “come on!” to get the blood flowing. Thus, Alex de Minaur is one of the more stable prodigies on the tour right now.
Another strong piece to Minaur is his serve. Alex de Minaur may be a defensive player a majority of the time but he still has a pretty fast serve to compensate for the lack of offense in his game. At six foot on the dot, Alex de Minaur is a bit under the average height of a tennis player.
But his serve can rival most players. This is the main offensive tool of his game. He likes to carve out hard angles with his first serve and then follow up with an approach shot which he can hopefully use to end the point. Most of the time this works out well.
But if it doesn’t and he’s forced to the baseline, his exceptional defense will be able to play a key factor in holding his serve.
Thus, Alex de Minaur’s game mostly leans towards a defensive aspect but he does have a threatening tone to him largely thanks to the serve he possesses right now.
Cons
The most common problem among players both amateur and professional is a lack of defense. If you look at top players like Nick Kyrgios and Roger Federer, they have an exceptional offensive game but lack defense.
In fact, Nick Kyrgios plays nearly full on offense throughout the entire match, losing points mainly because he fails to hold his own when on the run. Meanwhile, Roger Federer has adapted his game to full-on offense in order to compensate for his age.
However, for Alex de Minaur, it’s the lack of offense which proves most threatening to his tennis game. We’ve already established the fac that Alex de Minaur’s defense is near exceptional. No one can beat his speed when chasing down shots and it’s clear that you’re always going to have to play one more shot if you want any chance of dethroning the Aussie.
But the fact of the matter is that Alex de Minaur sometimes gives up these points too easily in order to go on the defense and while this may seem to make sense because he’s a defense-oriented player, it’s actually not the case here.
Having strong defense should be a shield in order to rely on if the offensive game doesn’t work but Alex de Minaur’s sword is his defense and he has no shield. Don’t get me wrong. He does attack in his matches but whenever he gets into rallies, it’s likely that he’ll lose the rally and be put on the run.
Alex’s strength is in his speed and that comes from the power he can generate from his feet but the footwork needed in order to hit a strong forehand or backhand in a neutral stance is lacking in terms of Alex de Minaur.
Thus, it’s easy to attack Alex de Minaur but it’s not easy to finish it off. However, this is why Alex de Minaur can sometimes struggle against top names like Rafael Nadal, Alexander Zverev, and Roger Federer.
Alex de Minaur’s game is great for playing people who don’t have the strongest attacks and don’t know how to position around net but when it comes to a big player, de Minaur will definitely struggle.
For example, a match against Federer would likely result in de Minaur facing several serve-and-volley points that he can’t beat.
And if he’s on the run versus Federer, it’s likely he won’t be able to pass him since Federer has some of the best net game on the singles ATP tour. Furthermore, if de Minaur played someone like Alexander Zverev or Rafael Nadal, he would just get pummeled from the baseline no matter how good he is at running down the ball.
Thus, Alex has a long way to go before he can truly harness all the power he has right now. He’s already got a strong base with the defense that he hones but he can take it a step farther by building an even stronger baseline game that will help him in the long run.
At nineteen years of age, Alex de Minaur has a bright future ahead of him. He’s already won the 2019 Sydney Invitational and it also looks like he’s on track to do well at the Australian Open. That being said, this could very well be the year he wins a major title—ATP 500 or above.
For most professional players, it could take years to even win a title let alone get on the professional tour. However, for de Minaur, he’s already past the formalities and he’s looking to make history.
With the skillset he holds, it’s a possibility he could beat Lleyton Hewitt’s legacy.
His best bet is going to be during the clay season. With so many Masters tournaments and ATP 500 tournaments during this time, it’s prime picking for the Aussie wonder.
In fact, clay is going to be the area where De Minaur should thrive the most.
We’ve already established the fact that Alex likes to run and he likes to run a lot. This is going to aid well for Alex during the clay court season. Balls on the clay court are slower and much easier to get.
Thus, offense isn’t really the biggest factor during this time.
If Alex can get his rallies to be much more threatening, then he’s going to be a nightmare to deal with at Roland Garros and the other tournaments surrounding it. Of course, he’s going to have to face the “King of Clay,” Rafael Nadal and many other adversaries.
Names like Dominic Thiem, Novak Djokovic, and Alexander Zverev are especially threatening on this surface and because of this, it isn’t going to be a free pass for Alex de Minaur.
With so many clay court tournament around the springtime, though, there’s a good chance Alex might not even have to face any of these players.
If Alex can’t title when the clay courts are around, then he might be able to title yet again on the hard court. Like the clay courts, the hard courts have a large number of tournaments throughout the year. The only difference is that the hard courts are played on all throughout the season.
They’re first most prominent during the times when the Australian Open is around and then come back into the spotlight before and after the U.S. Open.
That being said, with the consistency that De Minaur plays at, it is extremely likely that he will be able to snag a title at one of these tournaments.
But when it comes to Grand Slams, it’s quite unlikely that he’ll be able to win one at this time. While he may be a great player and he does hold several strong attributes, his main weapon does not bode well to the Grand Slam stage.
Each Grand Slam is best three out of five and with seven rounds, only the players with the best physique and endurance can make it to the end. Alex de Minaur might have some of the fastest feet on tour but his endurance won’t be able to match up.
Since he likes to play defense a majority of the match, Minaur is going to be exerting a lot of energy on the court running back and forth, more than the other players. Furthermore, with a lacking offensive game compared to other players in the top fifty, Alex de Minaur is going to have longer games on average.
Therefore, right now, his physique would probably only be able to last four or five rounds before falling. If he can fix his rallies and add a little more pace to his offensive shots, I think that within the next few years, there will definitely be a chance of Minaur winning a Grand Slam.
When people think of Australian tennis, they think of Nick Kyrgios. But now, there’s a new player on the stage and his name is Alex de Minaur. He’s a versatile, explosive speed demon on the court who can’t be outpaced.
Right now, he’s the fastest kid on the tour and his defense is impeccable. One of the best pieces to his game is the fact that he can run down almost any ball on the court.
However, this does make him susceptible to a one-dimensional playstyle.
Despite this, Minaur has had one of the best seasons of his early career in 2018 and now, in 2019, he’s looking to take it one step further. He’s already won the 2019 Sydney Invitational and now, he’s looking to take on the Australian Open.
He has several years left in his colorful career and it doesn’t look like he’s going to be going anywhere anytime soon. Sure, he has some things to work on when it comes to his game but he’ll definitely be one of the top tennis players in the coming years.
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